Measure Q in Redondo Beach passes with comfortable margin

UPDATED: As of 7 a.m. Wednesday, Measure Q has passed 13,589 votes to 7,862, with all precincts reporting.

A bond measure to cover technology expenses at Redondo Beach Unified - and guarantee more local control of school funding - enjoyed a comfortable lead early Wednesday morning.

With 74 percent of the precincts reporting, Measure Q had taken 63.1 percent of the vote, safely above the 55 percent threshold for passage.

It will be the third bond measure approved by Redondo Beach voters for the school district since 2000.

Measure Q - which had no official opponents - calls for borrowing $63 million to spend on a wide range of things. These include anything from upgrading computers to installing solar panels on the parking-lot shade structures to revamping security fencing and replacing paper textbooks with electronic ones.

But the measure is also an effort to build a buffer against what officials call the "onslaught wave" of cuts that would have been in store had California voters rejected Proposition 30, Gov. Jerry Brown's statewide tax-hike initiative for schools.

Redondo officials had warned that Proposition 30's failure would translate into a $3.8 million annual hit to the district. Measure Q will save the district roughly $2.2 million a year, largely because it shifts Redondo Union's ongoing technology expenses to the funding stream created by voters.

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With the victory for Proposition 30 - meaning school funding will remain flat - Measure Q will be a kind of bonus.

Although Measure Q had no official opponents, the Redondo Beach teachers union took a neutral position, opting instead to devote its energy rallying for Proposition 30.

Measure Q will levy $24 per $100,000 assessed value of every property in town. For the average Redondo Beach homeowner, this amounts to about $100 a year. The tax lasts 25 to 40 years. Redondo Beach taxpayers currently shell out about $56 per $100,000 for Measure C, passed in 2008.